Find easier active OpenNTF Projects via the new Activeness Indicator

Posted by Niklas Heidloff on August 17, 2010

One of the most requested features in
the IdeaJam
was an activeness indicator to differentiate active projects from projects
that are not further continued. While it is good to know whether a project
is still active, the same indicator can be used to filter projects so that
it's often easier to find valuable projects.

We've implemented an algorithm that determines
daily whether a project is active or not. A project is active if any of
the project leads (owners) has contributed any type of document (e.g. release,
screenshots, documentation, etc.) within the last year. We choose this
method so that we don't have to rely on manual actions of project leads.

The algorithm reduces the number of
active projects to 175 from a total of >400 projects.

You can see now in the project description
the status of the projects 'active' or 'not active'.

On the projects
page the name lookup combobox
at the top shows only the active projects. Not active projects does not
mean that the projects don't provide value. So a similar combobox at the
bottom of the page still allows finding not active projects as well as
the full text search and all of the views.

We're working on other extensions in
this area to leverage the same activeness indicator in other ways to find
projects (e.g. the views).